Most e-mail systems allow inclusion of attachments which are binary files such as formatted documents, graphics and programs. The purpose of this function is to send items in their original format over the network. Thus you can attach a word processing file, complete with formatting features—underlining, boldface, fonts—or a graphic image that cannot be displayed over ordinary e-mail. You attach a file by including its name in the appropriate field in the message header. Files can be attached only when they are located where the e-mail program can find them. With host-based programs like PINE, files to be attached have to be located on the host system. Files on your local workstation have to be transferred to the host before they can be attached to a PINE message. Since each mail system handles attachments differently, it is critical to check with recipients beforehand. Attachments are not displayed within the message, but a flag in the mail header tells the recipient that a file is attached. At the receiving end of a message with an attachment, you are notified that there is something special going on, sometimes with some information about what to do. You detach the file from the message in order to view or use the item with the appropriate software. When the e-mail software runs on your workstation, files received as attachments end up on your hard disk automatically. With a host-based e-mail system, getting an incoming attachment to your local workstation requires transferring it from the host.
With respect to reviewing e-mail message summaries, the first view you get of incoming mail is usually a list of brief headers, including shortened versions of the date and time the messages were sent, the name of the sender, and the subject heading the sender gave it. The actual content and format of your message will vary according to your local system, but the principle is essentially the same. Your inbox contains all the new mail you have received but have not yet read. It also can contain old mail, read but not deleted, from previous sessions and, for a time, may even include messages you have deleted but not yet purged.
With respect to downloading and uploading files, it sometimes may be necessary to move files between computers in order to have items where they can be used effectively. For example, with host-based systems, messages and attachments arrive at the server. The incoming messages may be a document you wish to edit with your workstation's word processing program. Attachments to e-mail messages are coded documents that can be read only by programs on your workstation or may be programs themselves that must be run on your own system. In each case, you would have to transfer, or download, the file from the host to your own workstation (computer). Likewise, you may create files on your workstation that you wish to include as part of an e-mail message. In those cases, you will need to transfer, or upload, those files to the host system before you can use them in e-mail. In an efficient messaging engine, when a message with an attachment is sent, the attachment is stored on the post office server and the mail delivered to the recipient. Only when the recipient makes a request to open the attachment is it retrieved from the server.
The ease of sending e-mail messages on the Internet has created a significant amount of junk electronic mail that is indiscriminately downloaded into the recipient's personal computer. Value time is wasted by recipients who must winnow through unsolicited junk mail messages to find useful e-mail relevant to their personal interests.
For the foregoing reasons, it is therefore an object of the present invention to download to an electronic mail (hereinafter sometimes referred to as “e-mail”) receiving device of a recipient for reading, printing, text-to-speech and/or storing an e-mail message with an inserted advertisement which is relevant to the recipient personal interests.
It is another object of the present invention to allow the e-mail recipient to “opt-in” (receive e-mail messages with inserted advertisements) or “opt-out” (receive e-mail messages without inserted advertisements).